Malcolm X

Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz; 1925 – 1965) was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist whose dazzling intellect and fearlessness made him an enduring global icon of liberation. After a troubled youth and self-education in prison, he became the national spokesman for the Nation of Islam, expanding its membership exponentially.

Malcolm exhorted Black Americans to cast off mental servitude, embrace their African heritage, and defend themselves against racist brutality 'by any means necessary'. In 1964, following a split with the Nation of Islam, he made the pilgrimage (Hajj) to Mecca, experiencing a spiritual transformation that led him to embrace universal Islamic brotherhood. Returning to the US, he founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAU) to elevate the Black struggle from a domestic civil rights dispute to an international human rights crisis at the United Nations, before his assassination in Harlem in 1965.